If you want to jump into the rap game, you've got to start somewhere. Biggie started on street corners in Brooklyn, rapping to a boom-box and battling any comers, sometimes winning, sometimes losing. That's how he learned his craft, always getting better. You've probably got it much easier, but the goals are exactly the same. Listen to the sounds around you, write some rhymes, and start building those rhymes into songs.

Steps

Part 1

Listening to Hip-Hop

1

Listen to as much hip-hop music as possible. You need to listen to a wide variety of hip-hop and rap before you start trying to make your own rhymes. Study the history and the culture of rap and try to understand the core and foundations of it. It's a living, breathing thing that you need to engage with. If you don't know who Big Daddy Kane is, or you only know Ice Cube as a funny guy in the movies, you've got some research to do.

Over the past few years, free online mixtape culture has become an important part of hip-hop.[1] Lil Wayne's rise to fame in the mid-2000s was on the back of mixtapes given away for free online, some composed largely of freestyles. Checking out free mixtapes is a great way to jump into the conversation happening in contemporary hip-hop.

2

Listen actively. Study other rappers' skills until you can form your own style. You're not biting, you're learning. Copy out their rhymes and freestyles and read them as you would poetry. Studying their music is also good to find some solid beats that you may want to try rapping over.

Eminem is known for his quick flow, intricate rhyme schemes, and metrical perfection, while Lil Wayne is known for his great one-liners and similes. Find rappers that appeal to you. A$AP Rocky, Tribe Called Quest, Big L, Nas, Mos Def, Notorious B.I.G., Tupac, Kendrick Lamar, Freddie Gibbs, Jedi Mind Tricks, Army of The Pharaohs, MF Grimm, Jus Allah, Shabazz Palaces and the Wu-Tang Clan are very different and talented rappers or groups worth checking out.

Listening to rap that you specifically don't like can also be helpful in trying to craft a style. Form opinions. Make arguments. Debate with your friends about different rappers. Talk about who sucks and who's great.

3

Memorize some verses. Pick a jaw-dropper from one of your favorite tracks and listen to it repeatedly, until you've committed it to memory. Recite it as you walk around. Get a feel for the syllables and the flow of the words, the way the words feel as you say them.

Think about what stands out for you about this verse. What do you like about it? What made it memorizable?

Find an instrumental version of the song with the verse you've memorized and practice reciting it to the music. This will help you get a feel for the flow and the speed at which the music occurs.

Part 2

Writing Rhymes

1

Write lots of rhymes. Keep a notebook with you at all times, or use your phone to write down rhymes, and try to write at least 10 rhymes a day. At the end of the week, go back through the rhymes you wrote and pick out the best ones to create a "Best of the Week" list, which you might use to start a song. Cut out the wack lines and corny stuff and only keep the best.

At the end of the week, you might only end up with a couple of lines. That's ok. That's good. When you're first starting out, you're going to write a lot of crappy lyrics. There's no way around it. It takes work and lots of effort to create songs that anyone will want to listen to.

2

Keep "rhyme clusters" in your notebook. A rhyme cluster is a group of short lines and words that are all interchangeable with each other. So, any lines with words like "wack" "sack" "jack" "backpack" and "Aflac" could all be in the same cluster. Start building an encyclopedia of rhymes that you can start to memorize, and consult when you're writing songs or free styling.

3

Hammer your lyrics into songs. After a couple of weeks of writing lines, you should start having a good store of them built up. Add a couple together, move them around, and start thinking about how you might build a song. Write more lines to fill in the gaps and put it all together.

Story songs usually have a hard-luck element to them in classic hip-hop. Stories need to address the Who, What, and When elements to paint a vivid picture of the scene or the event you're describing. Raekwon and Freddie Gibbs are great story-telling rappers.

Boast raps feature lots of one-liners. Look no further than Lil Wayne for the self-crowned king of bragging in rhyme. Use lots of similes and metaphors to compare yourself to all manner of greatness.

Pop rap or trap is all about the chorus. Chief Keef's rhymes may be super terrible, but he's got an ear for a killer hook. Aim for a simple line or two that slides right into the beat. "Don't Like" and "Sosa" have simple ear-worm choruses that get stuck in your head for weeks. Ditto Soulja Boy's "Crank That." For more classic examples, think of Wu-Tang's "C.R.E.A.M." and anything by Snoop Dogg.

4

Try to freestyle. Find a beat you like, an instrumental version of a track you're into, or just try rapping over the intros and the outros. Find the beat, feel it, and try to start spitting what you've got bouncing around in your head.

Start with a good "starter line," something that pops and gets your mind going, then rely on your clusters of rhymes to start letting things unspool from there.

Don't try free styling in front of anyone until you've practiced a lot. It can fall apart quickly, but try to stay on beat, keep with the flow and find your way again if you start to stumble. Don't stop, or it'll be over. Even if you have to rap nonsense syllables, make sure they rhyme and stay with it.

5

Take your time. You're not going to write great songs yet. Focus on the little things, getting better at freestyles, and learning to write songs. Develop your own voice and style without biting from other rappers. You don't want to be just like any of them, you want to be your own voice and your own rapper.

Even Chief Keef and Soulja Boy, rappers who hit big at 16 and 17, didn't pop out of their mamas writing hit songs, it took them 6 or 7 years of rapping constantly before they found the goods. Be critical of your work, if you're going to take rapping seriously. GZA was 25 before he found success, and he had been rapping since he was a child.

Part 3

Taking the Next Step

1

Check out a freestyle competition or a rap battle. Here, contestants have to freestyle over a beat selected by the DJ and you'll be timed, so you won't be given much time to think before you've got to start rhyming. If you want to battle, you'll also have another MC across from you who may be more experienced and eager to embarrass you with crude diss lines to get cheers from the audience. This is one of the most exciting parts of the rap game, but you'll need to develop thick skin and considerable skills before trying this in public.

It's a good idea to attend a lot of competitions before attempting to compete in any of them. Get a good feel for your skills and the skills of the other competitors before jumping on stage.

2

Make original music. try to get in touch with some up-and-coming producers in your area or online to provide you with some original beats to work with. If you have a beat, making hip-hop music requires little more than the most basic audio editing software and a microphone.

Attending shows, competitions, and battles is a great opportunity to meet other rappers and beatmakers you might collaborate with, or who might have resources to share with you.

3

Put your music online. If you eventually get enough material that you're proud of, start a YouTube channel for your music and start sharing your music across social media. Put a mixtape together and release it for free on the Internet. Increasingly, rappers who get signed to big contracts generate publicity and buzz by releasing free mixtapes.

Burn CD-R copies of your music and give it out at concerts or gatherings with your contact information included on it.

4

Keep practicing. Keep beats on your phone or iPod, and freestyle inside your head while doing every day things like walking down the street, taking the bus or train, or grocery shopping. The more you practice your rhymes, the better they'll get.

Score0 / 0

Part 1 Quiz

Which of the following examples is correct?

Only listen to music you like.

Nope! You should listen to tracks from a wide range of rap artists, past and present, not just your favorites. Listen to music you don't like so that you can figure out what it is you dislike and avoid doing that in your own music. There’s a better option out there!

Avoid memorizing other artists' raps.

Try again! You should definitely memorize tracks from other artists. Doing so helps you understand how to stay on beat and keep the pace. It will prepare you for memorizing your own raps, as well. There’s a better option out there!

Study the history and culture of rap.

Yes! You should definitely study the history and culture of rap. Find out who influenced who, who knew each other, where the hip-hop scene started, and more. Understanding the foundation of rap can help you learn to make music successfully! Read on for another quiz question.

Score0 / 0

Part 2 Quiz

What are the three categories of rap songs?

Hits, stories, and freestyles.

Not exactly. Freestyles can turn into songs, but they aren't songs on their own. Additionally, any song can be a hit, so a hit song is less of a category and more of a feature. Click on another answer to find the right one...

Story songs, boast raps, and pop rap.

Correct! Story songs paint a picture of a scene or experience; boast raps are filled with one-liners, bragging, and disses; and pop rap or trap focuses on the catchy chorus. Read on for another quiz question.

Freestyles, boast raps, and choruses.

Nope! A chorus is simply a part of a song, not a song in itself. Freestyles can be songs, but they don't fall into one of the three categories. Pick another answer!

Score0 / 0

Part 3 Quiz

True or False: You should burn your original music onto CDs and hand them out for free.

True

Absolutely! In order to get your name and music out there, you should give out free copies of your songs. Take CDs to concerts, rap battles, and other gatherings and give them away. Make sure to put your name and contact information on them as well! Read on for another quiz question.

False

Try again! While it may seem like you won't make any money if you give your CDs away for free, it's actually a great way to get started! If you don't find a way to spread your music, no one will know who you are! Pick another answer!

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Community Q&A

Try singing the alphabet really fast and get used to doing it fast. Then learn the words of a song and keep trying until you get it. Finally, listen to the song before you go to bed as it well help stick in your memory -- you might even dream about it.

To start, just write out some words that rhyme. For example, backpack, snap back, snack pack, cracker jack. It can even be more than one or two words (e.g. capacitor, mad at her, Labrador, etc.). When you first get into it, it won't need to make sense, but before you start going public it has to make sense. Keep practicing.

How can I get my name out there and be discovered by other rappers who would want to work with me?

wikiHow Contributor

Get an Instagram account and through Instagram, you can get your followers (people who see what pictures and videos you post). Then announce to them that you have uploaded a new video onto YouTube and that they should check it out.

If you want a deal, you should make a CD of 7-12 of your best songs, hand it out to artists, and interview/audition for producers. However, you could also share your music online, with sites like Soundcloud and Bandcamp.

I am an American but live in another country until next year. How can I get my music online and move forward?

wikiHow Contributor

Try to build a fan base online using YouTube or other social media, and let everyone know that you can rap. You can also do gigs while in the other country. Then when you get back to America do the same, and that way you'll have domestic and foreign fans.

Tips

Rap not only about yourself but about common things other people go through. Try to be not a role model but a healer.

Form a crew with other MCs to learn from one another.

Give some emotion to your song to make the song more about you.

Once you have written your rhymes, you should improve them by counting up how many syllables are in each line, then editing them to vary your tempo. If you want a steady tempo, keep a relatively similar number of syllables in each line. Once you have this down, you should experiment with different tempos. This will improve your flow.

Don't rush your lines. Make them so you can say them clearly.

If you practice in private first you will be able to do it better. You can also look online for some good lyrics if you a fast reader or some karaoke.

Start slow. Once you've practiced a lot you can maybe get a bit faster.

Use similar beats and rhythms that you can catch on to quickly.

Never copy someone's best cause it may put you in trouble. This is called plagiarism and is considered by some as a form of stealing.

Be comfortable with rapping out loud, even if someone might hear you. You won't get better if you never try.

When free-styling, always take your time. Remember, you're trying to memorize the lyrics so you can create poems and write them down.

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Birinchi Bania

Jul 11, 2017

"I am very much attracted to English rappers. I am an Indian, and I am thinking that even I can do something related to rap. I think if I take it seriously, I can do something in future. You gave a lot of information, and from today I am starting the rap career parallel to my engineering career. Maybe it sounds weird, but I want to do it. Thanks for providing so much information. "..." more

Rated this article:

Kamo Soaisa

Jul 18, 2017

"This helps me with patience, because all I was thinking about is trying to rap quick to get money. Patience was never a good answer until now. This helped me to keep calm and use time wisely, not rush into things. Thanks."..." more

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MM

Mbuso Makhosonke

Apr 13, 2016

"I learned that I need to have perseverance and hard work all the time, practice writing rhymes (at least 10 different rhymes, then take out the wack rhymes), and to pick the ones that are suitable for you and don't stop because it might be the end."..." more

DA

Dale Adams

Jul 2, 2017

"I'm 14 and trying to start rapping, because I'm going though a lot right now and I need something that can help me take my mind off it all. Thanks! I read the whole article and it helps a ton. "..." more

Rated this article:

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Zach Quinn

Jul 4, 2017

"Thanks, I'm ten years old and I wanna start rapping. I have not tried any of these steps yet, but they have told me how to start. Thank you creators, this was very helpful to me."..." more

A

Anonymous

Jul 18, 2017

"Thanks a lot for posting this article. It really helped me. Now I think I will do better. It really made sense and shed light on what to do to become a successful rapper. "..." more

JW

Jeremyiah Wilson

Nov 16, 2016

"It helped me revise all the steps I should take to get where I'm trying to be, and I am thankful. I will share this with others."..." more

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Anonymous

Jul 27, 2016

"What helped me most in this article is the tips for rapping, because am a novice rapper. So now I know a few tips."

EM

Emorhaan Micheal

Oct 20, 2017

"I like to rap because it is a way to express your anger, love and how much you care for others, even yourself."

CW

Chyna Williams

Jun 23, 2017

"This helped me, it showed me if I want something I got to work for it, it's not just going come overnight. "

RT

Radebe Themba

Jul 29, 2016

"It helped me when it said I must have a rhyming dictionary and I must write rhymes everyday."

MA

Mesai Aztlan

Aug 15, 2017

"Ever since I was 6, I've wanted to be a rapper. You've given me a lot of info, thank you."

A

Anonymous

Oct 14, 2017

"It helped because I don't have someone who can correct or advise me on how I rap."

NC

Nasser Chaudhry

Jun 6, 2016

"I loved the explanations, suggestions, and things you would need to know about."